প্রকাশ: 09/02/2024
Foreign Minister Dr Hasan Mahmud today
said that democracy in Bangladesh got strengthened despite conspiracies of BNP
and its ultra-radical Jamaat-e-Islami ally to foil the democratic process in
the country.
"BNP and Jamaat-e-Islami were
trying continuously to disrupt the democratic process in Bangladesh. They tried
to foil the elections in 2014, 2018 and then in 2024 by resorting violence, but
they could not be succeeded as people had rejected them for their anti-people
activities," he said.
The minister made the comments while
interacting with the media at Foreign Correspondents Club of South Asia (FCC,
South Asia) here on Thursday evening. Bangladesh High Commissioner to India Md.
Mustafizur Rahman was on the dias.
FCC President and veteran journalist
Venkat Narayan moderated the event while Secretary of the club Prakash Nanda
gave introductory remarks. Journalists belonging to different national and
international media outlets were present, among others.
Terming
BNP as an "opposition on the street", Hasan said the BNP and its
allies carried out attacks on different key (public) installations to foil the
recently held general election in Bangladesh. Even, they carried out arson
attacks in front of the Chief Justice's residence and public transport
resulting in the killing two people, he added.
Despite their conspiracies, the
minister said the election was held in a free, fair and transparent manner in
the history of Bangladesh and the voter turnout was good in the context of
global voters turnout in the recently held elections in many countries across
the world, even some European countries.
Responding to a query, he said since
Bangladesh is a free society, everybody has the right to speak freely. Taking
the advantage, some elements may give anti-India, anti-China and even
anti-Awami League slogans, but this tablet does not work now. "The fanatic
elements used to play the anti-India card in Bangladesh before the
election."
On India-Bangladesh relations, the
foreign minister said that relations between the two friendly countries had
reached a new height during the tenure of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her
Indian counterpart Narendra Modi.
"Relations of Bangladesh with
India bonded with blood as many Indian people and its soldiers sacrificed their
lives during the country's Great War of Liberation in 1971. So, this
relationship cannot be comparable with any other countries," he said.
About Teesta water sharing agreement
with India, he said the matter was discussed with the appropriate authorities
on many occasions. The central government had agreed to sign the deal, but the
state government is objecting to it, Hasan added.
"As you (India) are having the
election in March or April or May, So, after the election we will carry out the
issue with the government again and I hope that we will find a solution to this
end," he said.
Replying to another question, Hasan
said we uphold the values of democracy since Bangladesh is a pluralistic
society. "Definitely, Bangladesh is not a one-party state, it is a
multi-party democracy. As many as 29 political parties out of 44 registered
with the election commission contested in the last election," he informed.
Asked about border killing, the
minister said that they had raised the issue with the Indian authority after a
body of a BGB personnel was found inside Indian territory. We demanded to stop
border killing and the Indian side sought apology for that and an investigation
is going on to unearth the incident, he said.
About China, the foreign minister said
although China is not our next door neighbour, but it is our south Asia
neighbor and we have a very good relation with China as the country is a major
development partner of Bangladesh.
Besides, he said Bangladesh has been
enjoying a good relationship with the US and we are looking forward to further
strengthening our relationship in future for the benefit of our people.
Earlier, the foreign minister in his introductory remarks referred to Bangladesh's progress in the country's socio-economic sector during the last decade under the leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
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